Webby for Good is a collaborative program formed by The Webby Awards and WP Engine to showcase Webby-recognized projects built to change the world.

Describe your Webby-nominated project. What’s the elevator pitch?

To support the release of Save The Children’s first annual End of Childhood Report, we created a unique set of unboxing videos that made the Report’s staggering statistics more relatable to the global public.

Why this particular cause as the subject of your project/campaign? Was there a moment that inspired it?

Childhood should be a time for children to play, learn, and develop to their full potential. However, nearly one in four children around the world are being robbed of their childhoods, simply because of who they are or where they live. Save The Children launched their first annual End of Childhood Report and Index to generate empathy and awareness of this epidemic. They then tasked us with lending an emotional face to their cause.

What concerns were there about pursuing this idea? How did you get past them?

Having no paid media budget was a looming concern of ours—especially when the campaign’s success relied on people seeing our video. So we had to get creative to get the eyeballs we needed. Leveraging everything from search optimization to channel strategy to Save The Children’s global social presence, we were able to secure more than 700 media placements and double our engagement goals all without spending a dollar on paid media.

What was the most rewarding aspect of working on your project? What did you learn in the process that you didn't know/expect going into it?

Seeing all the various parts and pieces of the campaign come together on launch day was very rewarding. We kicked it off on International Children’s Day by pushing out our videos, taking over Facebook's own “Nonprofits on Facebook” page, hosting a media tour with Dr. Jill Biden, and arming Save The Children’s regional Facebook pages with a range of social assets. Everything went off without a hitch, making the months of careful planning all worth it.

What real-world impact were you hoping to make with this project? Did the real-world impact meet your expectations?

Save The Children wanted to raise global awareness of the End of Childhood Report and of the state of childhood around the world. Our video aimed to make the Report more relatable, lending an emotional face to a cause that often feels like a distant issue.

Did your team have a specific “breakthrough” or “a-ha” moment while formulating or executing this project?

Organizations release reports all the time. Most come and go, largely ignored by the public. So when Save The Children was looking to launch their first annual End of Childhood Report, we knew we needed to be disruptive. Our breakthrough moment came when we decided to tap into the genre of unboxing videos—leaning into their association with children and global popularity—and flip it on its head.

What was the most significant challenge that arose during your work on this?

Having no paid media budget presented a pretty daunting challenge—especially when we needed to get people to see our video. So we had to get creative with our media strategy and placement. Relying solely on organic reach vs. paid media dollars, we more than doubled our goals from impressions and engagement, vastly exceeding our—and our client’s—expectations.